Pressure is increasing on the Taoiseach and the British Prime Minister to break the deadlock over decommissioning and the formation of the shadow Executive.
Mr Tony Blair is due to hold separate talks with Mr Gerry Adams, Mr David Trimble and Mr Seamus Mallon at the Labour Party conference in Blackpool next week, in an effort to overcome the impasse on decommissioning and the formation of an Executive.
Following the public disagreement between Mr Trimble and Mr Mallon over the establishment of an Executive, he may also be called upon to persuade the North's First Minister and Deputy First Minister of the merits of their finding a uniform position on the issue.
In New York Mr Trimble said there were "going to be alarums and excursions, there are going to be bumps along the way. I would say to people with regard to comments that are made either by me or by Seamus which indicate slightly different approaches to particular issues, not to get excited.
"The two-year time span for prisoner releases and the two-year time span for the completion of decommissioning are not coincidental. Because it says in the agreement that decommissioning must be completed by the end of two years doesn't mean that it only should be started.
"The agreement puts a date by which it is to be completed. The implication is that it begins before then, and the whole implication of the agreement is that they go together."
In Fermoy, Co Cork, yesterday Mr Ahern said the Belfast Agreement was clear, and decommissioning was not a precondition to the establishment of the Northern Ireland Executive.
"The decommissioning of weapons is not a precondition to the establishment of the shadow Executive in Northern Ireland. This whole process has been about compromise, and I don't think anything is going to change now."
Mr Ahern said the demand by unionists for a start to decommissioning was understandable, but he warned that the agreement should not be held up as a result. There was a two-year deadline for decommissioning. It was still in place, as was the October 31st schedule for agreement on North-South bodies.
The Sinn Fein leader, Mr Gerry Adams, again demanded that the British and Irish governments ensure that the shadow Executive was established. He repeated that continued unionist insistence on prior IRA disarmament was making his position untenable.
Mr Adams insisted that the executive must be up and running speedily so that its members could participate in the North-South council which must be established under the terms of the agreement by the end of October.